Multitasking #1: Doing the Laundry

A real blog series! Starting now. One of the top 5 things I love: Multitasking.

I read somewhere at least once (vague enough for you?) that multitasking is really bad for your brain. You lose the ability to focus on really important tasks or something like that. I love to do a million things at once. It makes me feel really productive, and I don't really care if it's actually the opposite (unproductive, you might say).

At work I do lots of multitasking, but today I'm going to advise you about at-home multitasking. I don't spend very much time at home, so multitasking at home is a must.

Three "At Home" tasks that are very important to take care of:

1. Doing a load of laundry

2. Cleaning my bathroom

3. Painting my nails

You may be thinking, Why should these three tasks be completed in tandem? The major thing that these three tasks have in common is that all three must be done weekly. Also, two of the three (#1 and #3) have some serious time constraints:

Laundry - If you have an old school washing machine and dryer that doesn't sing you a song when it's done, then it is very easy to forget that it is time to (a) move the laundry from the washing machine to the dryer, (b) reset the dryer because the clothes still aren't dry, or (c) remove the clothes from the dryer promptly enough to prevent wrinkles. Our dryer does actually have a buzzer, but I always turn it off because it's so loud it makes me want to put my head through the wall.

Painting nails - Very serious nail-painting challenge: You cannot touch ANYTHING for an hour. Don't even think about trying to get around this rule, or you will mess up your nail polish.

Here are some general lengths of time for today's tasks:

Laundry: 40 mins washing machine, 50 mins dryer cycle 1, 50 mins dryer cycle 2

Cleaning bathroom: 20-30 mins

Painting nails: 15 mins shaping/painting, 60 mins drying!

Usually I get home from work around 7:30pm, so let's say it's laundry day:

7:30pm

Sort laundry, set washing machine

7:35pm

Wipe off bathroom counter and mirror. Bring computer into bathroom and turn on Law and Order. Put soft scrub in bathtub/shower, start scrubbing. Clean toilet and other dusty/dirty surfaces. Vacuum bathroom floor and spot clean. Rinse out bathtub. Pick out nail polish color and take out other nail supplies. Bring chair in bathroom and continue watching about 2-5 mins of L&O until washing machine is done. Pause Law and Order.

8:10pm

Put wet clothes in the dryer with dryer sheet. Empty lint trapper. Wash hands (because there's lint on them and because clothes aren't really clean until they go through the dryer. Fun fact.). Use the bathroom (because once nail polish is on, it's hard to unbutton pants.) Turn Law and Order back on. Paint nails. Restart Law and Order until about 1.5 episodes total have been watched. (Then hit pause.)

9:00pm

Reset dryer cycle because the first one is about to end, and the clothes still aren't dry.

Continue L&O. Allot about 5-10 minutes to move from bathroom to bed with computer, so nails don't get messed up. Interlock fingers so nails don't touch anything, and rest hands on stomach as a reminder not to touch anything, and in case sleep overcomes you mid-episode.

9:45pm

Clothes are probably dry. Nails are also dry. About half-way through a third episode of L&O. Take out the clothes and promptly fold them, so ironing pile is kept to a minimum. Including folding time, there's just enough L&O left to put on pajamas and go to bed!